Heather Holleman's Blog, page 61

What You Can Do

The Italian Mama offers great wisdom this AM about changing your mindset when faced with overwhelming tasks. When you think, “I can’t do this. It’s too overwhelming,” ask yourself what you can do instead. Maybe you can’t walk for an hour but you can walk for 20 minutes. Maybe you can’t do this or that big thing, but you can do something small. Do that small thing.

This works! As I sat to revise parts of my novel this morning, the task felt too large. I needed to research social media use in tween girls. I needed to work on some tension and characterization. Instead of sitting in defeat and saying, “I cannot do this!” I can remember what I can do. I can work on Chapter 24. I don’t have to do everything.

If you are overwhelmed right now, think of what you can do. You can drink some water. You can go move your body for 10 minutes. You can write just one note to the friend in pain. What is the small thing you can do?

I continue to love Italian Mama wisdom after a decade!

Plum Orchard Progress

So far, I have two plumcot trees growing into maturity. I still won’t have fruit for another few summers (at best, next summer), so I’m learning to “take the long view.” Plumcots need to cross-pollinate, so my orchard might not see fruit for much longer as I wait for the next tree to flower.

Meanwhile, much like God’s work in our own hearts, the plumcots undergo pruning, special fertilizer, watering, and protection against pests. I like participating in seasons of special care and protection for my plums because I remember that some years of our lives involve just being and growing without any output, productivity, or usefulness to the world. (And I’m not even sure I grew trees from seeds that will produce fruit! Who knows? Does it matter?)

What matters is this:  The Loving Gardener takes great delight in us in every season whether flowering and fruiting or simply being. And whether or not I ever see fruit, I’ve loved delighting in my little plumcot trees.

Writing and Speaking Update

This summer, I’m finishing the revisions for a middle-grade novel based on Seated with Christ, due to Moody Publisher by August. I’m excited to see what will happen with this adventure into fiction writing. A little girl who lives down the street asked me when she can read my book and she reminded me that her birthday is coming up! That made me happy to think of all the little boys and girls who might read This Seat’s Saved and find comfort and joy in it.

I’m currently waiting on endorsements I’ve requested for my book coming out this fall called The Six Conversations: Pathways to Connecting in an Age of Isolation and Incivility. Once you turn in a manuscript to a publisher, you correct edits from the developmental editor, and then you review what’s called “first pages” which is the typeset manuscript. I’ve finished this review, so this means the book is on its way.

I’m also finalizing contracts for my speaking engagements for the fall 2022 and spring 2023. So far, I’ll be in Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania, Iowa, and Tennessee. Please pray for wisdom, energy, and protection as I write and speak.

Spring Things

Two Books I’m Reading This Month

I’m excited to grow spiritually this summer, especially in the areas of “keeping a quiet heart” and in deeper freedom from any areas of comparison or insecurity. I realize that, now matter how hard we try to escape it, we breathe in the air of shame like it’s oxygen. We cannot escape it. Social media, our workplaces, and our family cultures can quickly become shame factories. There’s always a code of what success or happiness means, and if you’re not aligned, you’re not worthwhile.

There’s always more to learn about freedom from shame, even if you’re not sure what to call that feeling you have that you’re somehow not presentable in some area of your life. I think God is moving me more and more in the direction of helping set women free from shame. It will just about kill you.

I love continuing my research on shame from my graduate school days. With these above goals in mind, I’m reading The Quiet Way: A Christian Path to Inner Peace by Gerhard Tersteegen (the German religious writer from the 1700’s) and Shame Interrupted: How God Lifts the Pain of Worthlessness and Rejection by Edward T. Welch.

I’ll keep you posted on all I learn!

 

A Poem Read at Graduation

Some Special Parts of Being a Professor

Now that I’m a full-time professor at Penn State and serving in the Schreyer Honors College, I’m invited to several graduation ceremonies and parties for the first time in nearly 15 years. I’m so excited to celebrate my students! I’m so excited to have participated in a life’s journey; now I stand as a witness to this right of passage: college graduation.

Today, I’ll attend two receptions (one for my student I advised for her senior thesis as an English major and one for all the graduating seniors) and the Spring Medals Ceremony at a big arena. Tomorrow, I’ll attend a party at a hotel for my thesis advisee. While I won’t have to wear academic regalia from University of Michigan (the robes, hood, tassels, velvet trim, special colors, etc), I still dress up and celebrate at these events. Did you know that professors wear the academic regalia from the school from which they earned their PhD? That’s why every professor looks different on a college graduation platform.

It’s wonderful to be the elder, the one creating the rite of passage for others. So much of growing older means standing as a witness to the success of others and cheering from the stands.

What a joyful day, despite the cold, cold rain. I had a cute spring outfit, but instead, I’m in long pants and a warm suit jacket! That’s Pennsylvania for you!

Keep the Structure. You Never Know What Will Happen.

As you know, I’ve been blogging every day since March 2010. That’s a lot of writing. I’ve kept that ritual up because I never know what’s going to happen. Some blog posts have been truly inspired and have been used widely to bless others. Some blog posts indicate I just showed up and don’t have much to write. But the point is I showed up. I kept the structure. I had a repository ready for hope and joy and beauty. It stayed there, waiting.

I think about this “keeping the structure” idea with so many things now. I read the Bible, pray, and journal even if I’m not feeling like it because I never know what will happen as I make myself available to Jesus. I keep the structure. I keep an open heart for God.

It’s like when you keep a tree that never blooms because one day it might–like a silky dogwood we planted that took a decade to flower. It’s like when you keep a bird house because one day, blue birds might choose it. It’s like when you set out another chair at the dinner table because you never know when a new guest will come. You love the possibility of it all.

You put a structure in place in anticipation. You keep hope alive. You know that anything is possible.

 

First Little Sparrow Nest

My Love of Psalm 16

I loved reading Psalm 16 this morning. Psalm 16 is my favorite psalm and the first one I ever memorized. I hope you love it as much as I do. My favorite parts of Psalm 16 include these few verses: I say to the Lord, “You are my Lord; I have no good apart from you.” and  “the sorrows of those who run after another god shall multiply.” I treasure the declarations from the verses that follow that “the boundary lines have fallen for me in pleasant places; indeed, I have a beautiful inheritance. I bless the Lord who gives me counsel; in the night also my heart instructs me. I have set the Lord always before me; because he is at my right hand, I shall not be shaken. Therefore my heart is glad, and my whole being rejoices; my flesh also dwells secure.”

Finally, I love how David says this about God in verse 11: You make known to me the path of life; in your presence there is fullness of joy; at your right hand are pleasures forevermore.